The 1970 Autavia 1163GMT 2nd execution - A watch for pilots.

This GMT is often referred to as "Red Hands" because of the red sub register hands. These hands were a very unusual feature and although striking they did not make it onto any subsequent GMT version due to their legibility in certain lighting conditions. It is interesting to note that until recently aeroplane cockpit lights were normally always red, the reasons are multiple but our retinas are most sensitive and suffer more fatigue with the blue/green wavelength and red light allows for easier reading of instruments. The feedback was that the red hands were too hard to read within this environment and so this is why the red sub register hand experiment was a brief one! Although some red hands were changed by dealers upon request, we now know it is actually far rarer to find black sub register hands on this reference, most are found today still with their original red hands on.

Although the 1st and 3rd execution GMTs are rarer, the values for all three of the GMT executions are fairly close, with the 1st execution having a small premium. The normal range for the 1163GMT 2nd execution being £5500 - £13000 (head only) depending on condition. Interestingly there are only a handful of people who currently understand the rarity, and "pecking order" of the Heuer market, because much of the info in articles or on forums from ten years ago is now out of date, or just plain wrong. Even my Autavia book has been updated about seven times over the years, which equates to once for every year of release! In reality the Heuer collector market is still quite young, I would estimate a decade behind the more mature Rolex and Omega markets, so it will be interesting to see how things look in 2030...

If you are interested in finding out more about the Autavia GMTs or the Autavia, Carrera and Monaco models, click the link below to order one of the vintage Heuer collector reference editions or the Heuer Superstars "Holy Grail" book.